Lenore Skomal: Recovery is joint venture

The World's Best Patient goes under the knife today. It's a self-appointed title, but I've allowed him this superlative because the process of getting to this point has been herculean.

But I get ahead of myself. The World's Best Patient is formerly the titleholder of the World's Worst Knees. He's put off having a much-needed double-knee replacement for the length of our relationship, which now spans more than a decade.

To call him competitive is akin to calling the Pope religious. His sport is racquetball, which is the sole reason he wouldn't agree to the surgery until this point. Oddly, he can't walk, but he can play. And he likes to win.

In fact, he has taken great pride when each doctor who examines his X-rays marvels at his ability to play through pain. Because he likes to be the best at whatever he does, it appealed to his ego when the surgeon he finally picked told him, "Yours are the worst knees I've ever seen." He absolutely glowed. "The worst! Can you imagine?"

Well, I don't have to imagine. Nor does anyone else who has seen him walk. Reality is what we're dealing with now. And his rehabilitation, we've been warned, is crucial to how successful the ordeal is.

Because the only other surgery he's had during our time together was minor compared to this one, it's all I have had to go by when judging how the recovery will unfold. His personal discomfort was compounded by his male need to be completely self-sufficient -- an impossibility thanks to abject immobility -- so the outcome was lousy.

Every "How are you feeling?" on my part was taken as an affront to his masculinity and viewed as harassment. Like a wounded bear, he said he just wanted to be left alone. "Can't you understand that?"

Of course I can, because I'm fluent in English. But my office, my place of work, is located in our home -- a mere 23 steps from his recovery bed. Technically, he's on my turf now. And with no place to hide, the inevitable chance meeting is pretty much constant. Since that miserable recovery, we have joked -- and winced -- about his wretched behavior as a patient. Compounded with his profound hatred of dependency is his truculence about not following doctor's orders.

But after walking, rather, limping the long road to this decision, he says he has reflected on his behavior and plans on following all of the doctor's orders to the aspirin.